New Blog

Hello to all of our readers,

we decided to move our blog away from blogspot and host it on one of our servers. You can find it by going to alpinepics.com and click on blog, or directly going to www.alpinpics.com/wp. Of course you'll find a RSS feed there as well, so you won't miss a single post :-).
The reason why we moved? The pics we upload get post-processed by blogspot, removing some of the details (read sharpness...), leaving the pics look a bit "mushy"...

cheers,
Felix

Johannes in Garmisch

Well, it wasn't just Johannes.  Fabi, Max, Kev and Christoph also came along for the ride. Trails were sunny and dusty, and since they were so much fun we decided to do two tours:)

And another beautiful day in the mountains. This time we went a bit to high and hit quite some snow. I reeeeallllly like the squishy feeling when the shoes are getting soaking wet... But was worth it, as the trail down was perfectly dry most of the time. I quite like the contrast between snowy mountains and T-shirty weather. (But i still want to mention that i don't insist on the snow :-) ). In the pic Matze is enjoying a nice piece of trail....

Garmisch

Pic shows Fabi nose wheelying above Garmisch today with the Zugspitze in the background. Dry and dusty trails on the south sides, and a great trail to kick off the season with.

We had quite a hard time today to find an interesting trail with no snow! But due to some heavy scouting (thanks to Master Stone) we managed to score a perfect day. Barely any hikers and a perfectly dry trail. And those (friendly) hikers we met were quite surprised so see some bikers this early in spring. While carrying up, some wanted to know if this trail is in a Moser guide, as apparently they carried their bikes quite a lot while following some of the Moser trails ;-).
And one thing i can tell you for sure: it feels good to be on the bike again! And i don't care if people tell me the "Firn" is perfect right now :-).
For a change i took the D70s along today. It's amazing what you can do if you are able to sync the flashes up to 1/1000th of a second....
cheers, Felix

Tegernsee sunset

Wonderful sunset tonight. Had a Tegernsee evening ride and found some dry, snow free trails. Was great to be in the mountains riding a bike again:)

Isar trails

Pic shows Falk riding his shiny new Rock Mountain on the Isar trails. Light bursts stage left from one Nikon SB24, expertly hand held by Sebastian who is hiding behind the tree. As usual a walker strolls past at exactly the wrong moment, but Isar trails wouldn't be the same without the walkers, would they? ;-)

Winter biking

Spring is starting, I KNOW(!!!)... Nevertheless here's another vid with some winter biking. Vid was done by Chris from biking-hiking on the same day out i posted some pics of earlier. This was his first go at a video with his D90. Enjoy!

Spring riding

Here is a shot from the same weekend that Colin took another pic of the week over at the IBC Forum. Tine and i enjoyed a beautiful and quite ride. I think there were about 3 other people we met that day. And we didn't even have any contact with snow :-).

Lago trail flow

Pic shows Max flowing down a Lago trail last weekend. Dry trails and sunny weather seem to be a long way off in Bavaria right now...

Pedaliéro

Made front cover of number 18. Pic shows Max Schumann riding in Bavaria back in January. With the drop off to the right I can't believe how fast he took that bend, especially without spikes. Go and get the Mag, it's out now!

atmosphere

Sebastian beside the River Isar, Munich.

MTBRider 02/09

Announcement is a bit late but nevertheless: there were 2 pics of the awesome and legendary Nordpark Downhill 2008 in the previous MTB Rider issue 02/09 :-)

Salzburger land air time

Harald Philipp winter time riding close to Salzburg, Jan 09.

Apprentice bike mechanic...

Niall helping Papi with the bike servicing down in the cellar this afternoon.

Currently experimenting with Adobe Lightroom. I like it so far :-). Above is a picture which was basically an accident, a sideproduct of fooling around in LR :-). Dominik is enjoying some nice snow in Obergurgl.

Isar trails "road gap"

Max Schumann jumping the "road gap" on the Isar trails in January 09.

Chalet Jump

Matthias takes in some Chalet air time up at Kotalmjoch. Felix is hiding underneath/behind the shaded hump of snow taking fat shots with the fisheye...

Update Felix: And here is one of the fisheye shot from my hiding place. It is pretty much the same as the 3rd frame of Colin's shot...

Obergurgl

And here comes another skiing pic. I went out to Obergurgl with two of the piefke guys (more see here www.diewahnsinnigenpiefkes.at) to get some powder. The powder part didn't work out quite as good as expected, but the fun part did :-). At the end of the day we finally found a sweet chute and a good photo spot (Dominik ripping a nice line)

Same jump, different angle

Same jump, different angle. While Colin was using his extension :-) to get a pic of Matze above the lake, i was trying the opposite focal lens: fisheye..And here is a shot with my cheapo 200mm tele... I felt a bit inadequate next to Colin :-)

Above Achensee

Matze in air today, enjoying the snow before it turned to cement.

End of session at Emmering

Max Schumann taking the gear out at close to 1am. Was a late one.

Day out in the sun

I finally went out to do some snow shots again. We went to the Sellrain and enjoyed a beautiful day. Quite a lot of people had the same idea as we did, albeit with a "rodel". Guess for some we were quite the "lunatics of the day". However only positive reactions!! . The pic above is one of the few without a flash i got on my harddrive ;-). Chris doing some drifting.

And then we had some fun at the parking lot: a new actionsport was invented!!! This is what i call nordic diving (all rights reserved, patent pending)! Also goes under the name of snowdiving :-) (If i invent some stupid accessory, i will get filthy rich ;-)... mh, or i just have to somehow convince the rich old people that this is healthy.... mh... plotting.... )

Föhn rider

Super warm in Munich on 28th Feb 09. Ground turned to slush but the mountain views and light were fantastic. Pic shows Max Schumann in action.

Trail Könige

Max Schumann and Christian Schleker riding and bike testing in Bozen, February 09. Catch up on the full test and pics in Freeride magazine, 1/09.

Mountainbike Revue 01/08

Jiiipeh, pic of the month again, page 8/9 of this months' Mountainbike Revue :-). This time a team production of alpinepics: Colin in front of camera, me behind. Funny what stupid ideas 2 photogs on the same spot produce... It took us close to 4 hours to descend 50 height meters ;-). Thanks to MBR for the cool display. Get yourself a copy while it's hot of the press.

Winter Northshore

Emmering

A couple of pics from an indoor session at the E/Jan 09. Indoor lighting provided the ambient plus one strobe to freeze the rider and throw a shadow. Christian Schleker riding.

Winter Isar Trails

Chris on the Isar trails today, Munich. We cleared about 50cm of snow off the north shore first then took some shots and did some filming. 

Olympiaturm, Munich

Max in action today at Olympiapark. The snow was just starting, 5 mins later it was blizzards-ville-arizona.

Tree & manual

Spotted this fine tree and ridge line down at Olympia Park, Munich, a few weeks ago. Thank God I had the King of Manuals along with me at the time...

Klettersteig

Another pic from the Wilder Kaiser day in October 2008. Pic shows Harald riding some crazily exposed klettersteig section. Just hoping for more action like this in 2009!

Bike Magazine, März 09

Fotostory on pages 12 to 18, words by Harald, pictures by me. The article focusses pretty much on the superb riding we did in the Chiemgau area in Autumn 2008. Page 14 shows one of my favourite images: Harald riding a magnificent high mountain trail in magnificent light above a magnificent inversion. Being in the mountains doesn't get much better than this! Thanks Bike Mag for doing such a great job with the presentation.

Attack of the stick figures

No bikers around, so i had to draw my own motive .... This was my first try of light painting. Guess this can be improved a lot ;-). And i'm not the exactly a painter in the face of the almighty :-)
But was fun anyway!

Mtbtrailreview

Colin made it to mtbtrailreview :-)

Check out here.

Epic

Epic day with Felix, Hannah, Sebastian & Max above Innsbruck. This pic was taken when the plan was going according to plan. An hour later it started going pear shaped. Didn't get back to the car until 21:30. Got a couple of good shots though! ;-)

Season is over ...

A short film about Harald Philipp made by Sebastian Doerk fotografie. Considering the 5d MkII was barely out it's box and this is his first film then I think it's an extremely good effort. Harald's riding is as insanely good, as ever, and this video succeeds in capturing some of his summit ride flow. I especially like the D300 snow shower piece near the end, and this, to me, epitomizes the value of mixing video with stills. I have a feeling there's a lot more of this to come through 2009. Let's hope so.

Why i love Innsbruck

Went up to the Seegrube today. Was supposed to be a spot check for tomorrow, but turned out quite differently once i meet Julia on the slope. Just enjoyed the sun, and we even found some good snow.

And this morning, when i left at my house, someone made my day! Ran directly into this one (sometimes it's the little things that make you smile):

Zipfelbobcross

Wondering what the title means? Don't know what a Zipflbob is? Check here : www.zasworld.at. Had the opportunity to take event photos at the Zipflbob-Nightcross last Saturday. Was quite funny to watch some nuts sliding down a steep ski piste with a mind-boggling speed, trying to not hit the obstacles in their way (like other contestants, or the gates :-) ). Afterwards a freeride show took place, with some bikers going over a kicker. Above pic was taken with 2 flashes, one from the camera left, warmed with a gel, and one from camera right....

Herzogstand

Sundown at Olympiapark

Winter time Isar trails

These trails are fabulous right now. Frozen rock hard, plenty of grip and bone dry. Photo shows Max Schumann flowing along just south of the Tierpark.

Schafreuter (2101m)

Skied up here this afternoon with Markus. Light and visibility were f**king amazing :) Pic shows Markus just below the summit into his first couple of turns. Snow wasn't that great, Bavaria could really do with some more snow! Was fun anyway.

Point of View

Tried some POV photography the other day. Me chasing Matze between some trees. Not fully satisfied with the setup, but i think it got some potential.... I triggered with a remote which i hold in my left hand (therefore the cable...). See some more captures at alpinepics.net